Cardiac Rehabilitation: Serious Committment That's Worth It

Brian Boekhout | posted February 11, 2010 |

Cardiac rehabilitation^* is a program designed to help people recover from a cardiac event, such as a heart attack. It’s conducted under the constant supervision of multiple medical professionals, including a physician, and is used to stabilize, slow or even reverse the progression of cardiovascular disease, ultimately reducing the risk of heart disease, another heart attack or even death.

The programs are based in exercise routines and strength training, and they often include the use of equipment such as treadmills, bikes, elliptical machines and rowing machines. Some also incorporate walking or jogging at a track, if available. During these sessions, the medical professionals supervising you will monitor your vital signs throughout all activities, follow your progress, note any changes in your symptoms, and make appropriate adjustments as needed.

Most programs start slowly, with activities building in intensity at a pace that best suits the patient’s abilities and cardiac system. For example, if you can only walk for five minutes with normal vital sign responses, then your program goal will be to do that several times -- and only increase when your body and heart are ready for it. This physiologic progression will eventually increase your stamina. Then, as your endurance and tolerance increases, you’ll be asked to increase the distance, time, and/or intensity of your activity.

What’s unique is that cardiac rehabilitation is about much more than just exercise. While physical activity forms its core, programs also include planning and counseling sessions, during which you and a medical professional develop exercise and diet plans, identify and modify future risk factors (such as high blood pressure, smoking and high cholesterol levels, among other things), and provide emotional support and vocational guidance (to help you return to work as soon as possible).

If that weren’t enough, the programs can also assist you in improving your overall lifestyle. The bottom-line goal of cardiac rehab, obviously, is to help your cardiovascular system heal, but it also promotes a change to a “heart healthy” lifestyle that will impact your decisions for the rest of your life. Throughout my career, I’ve seen people use the benefits of cardiac rehab as a means to get in shape, quit smoking, improve diets, manage stress and more.

About two and a half years ago, my mother went through a cardiac rehab program that lasted several months. She went in multiple times per week and went through a consistent routine that was made up of the following:

1. Weigh-in and application of monitoring device upon entrance

2. Assessment of cardiac plan, goals and progress

3. 5 to 10 minutes of stretching and warm-up

4. 30 minutes of activity with constant vital-sign monitoring

5. Daily education on cardiac sensitive topics such as diet, cholesterol, healthy habits, etc.

6. 30 additional minutes of activity with constant vital sign monitoring

7. 5-10 minutes of cool down

My mother will tell you that it was difficult process that required a serious commitment, but the end benefits were very much “worth every minute.”  She went as far to say that everyone should have the opportunity to learn what she’d learned in cardiac rehab.

^* The information above pertains to cardiac rehabilitation in general and not to Medicare-certified cardiac rehabilitation.